Diamond in the Rough
by Addicted to Antics
Summary: Entries for the Sailor Moon Monthly LJ Community's Jan/Feb 2010 theme starring the effervescent blue-eyed rabbit, Usagi.
1. The Next Step PG

_Diamond in the Rough_

Sailor Moon Monthly LJ - Usagi

Theme: Family

Genre: General/Romance

Version: Manga

Rating: PG

* * *

Serenity was a very, very impatient woman. Although she understood her daughter's dilemma ("I simply cannot proceed without something borrowed, okaa-chan. And Sayuri-chan said I could borrow her favorite vintage pearls from France!") she was far more eager to just get on with the ceremony so she could indulge in a much-needed cry and dream of grandchildren.

"Usa-chan, you've never been one to follow traditions," she reminded the rose-haired woman pacing in the dressing room. "Careful darling, you'll ruin your hair."

Usagi ignored her warning and tossed a frenzied glance over to Arisu, who looked about ready to run her Regina Rapier through her offending colleague. "Where is she?"

The younger woman exhaled sharply as she ran a hand through her long, straight emerald locks. "She's on her way. Got stuck in traffic, or whatever."

"Or more likely, she's hungover," Natsumi muttered to a giggling Sachiko with a roll of her crimson eyes.

Usagi groaned, prompting the retired queen to unclasp the pearls she wore at her own wedding eons ago before offering them to the young sovereign. "My dear, if you would like them, please take them." Her daughter simply smiled and shook her head.

"Even if I were to wear your wedding pearls, I'd still have to wait for Sayuri-chan. I couldn't bare to start without her."

As if on cue, a disheveled young woman barreled into the room while fixing her bright pink curls into a surprisingly lovely updo. Serenity held onto her pearls in case Sayuri had forgotten her own set, but was quite relieved to find that her daughter's decoy had indeed come equipped with the goods. She thrust them at the bride-to-be while panting through a very lengthy apology.

Usagi beamed at her and pulled her into an embrace. "Thanks, Sayu-chan. They're lovely."

Sayuri pulled away and held the queen at an arm's length away from her, examining Usagi with the precision of a Secret Service agent. After a moment, she winked. "You look ravishing, Usa-chan. As per the ush, naturally," she lilted in the Parisian accent Serenity loved so much. It always amused her at the half-French girl's utter lack of French character... with the exception of her natural beauty and love of champagne.

The two girls invited the other girls into their huddle as Hotaru strode into the room, a questioning expression sewn into her face. "Are you ready yet?"

Usagi nodded from the group. "Yes, I think we're ready." Her dark-haired best friend gave her a thumbs-up and vacated the room, presumably to get the attention of the father of the bride.

And that was Serenity's cue to take her seat in the service. She pulled her daughter away from her guardians for a moment and sighed, the first of many butterflies beginning to take wing inside of her stomach. With a sigh, she ran a hand down Usagi's fair cheek. "Usagi, I just want you to know that every woman gets a little nervous on her wedding day-"

Clear red eyes sparkled up at her. "But okaa-chan, I'm not nervous. I'm ready to start the rest of my life."

Serenity felt a tear slide down her face as her smile broadened. "And I thought I was the only one completely void of nerves at my wedding. Well, I guess that means you've made the right choice. But I want you to know that, regardless of how many daughters you adopt, regardless of how many granddaughters those daughters give you, you will always be my Small Lady. My baby girl. And I'll always be here for you, even when I'm not physically around anymore, to guide and support you through all of your endeavours." Tears welled in her daughter's eyes, but she did a good job in keeping them from falling and ruining her make up. "I'm so, so proud of you and the woman you've become. And you're going to be an even better ruler than I, but I won't hold that against you," she added with a giggle.

A large hand rested on her shoulder and she turned to face her dear husband. "My turn for the sentimental mush, Usako."

The previous queen nodded and kissed Endymion before wrapping her arms around her daughter. "I love you, darling. So give Kiku-chan some siblings, please." Usagi blushed as they pulled apart.

And Serenity left the room, fastening once more the pearl necklace of her youth as she took a seat next to her adopted granddaughter. The green-haired child wiggled excitedly beside her, dreamily lifting a doll into the air, or rather, some mirthful dreamland in which the pretty doll was a princess in the sky, drifting over her people with the love and affection only dream princesses are capable of exhibiting. A second tear dribbled down her face at the sweet innocence of this child, this girl who had been a poor little orphan running about the city selling flowers to the big, worldly people above her, this girl who had awakened Usagi's maternal instincts with one toothy grin.

Dragging her eyes away from her darling granddaughter, she turned to the groom. Helios stood below the altar, quietly chatting with Hotaru (his best man, surprisingly enough.) And as if to even deepen Serenity's sureness that these two were made for one another, he practically oozed the same certainty that Usagi had. Granted, he was considerably calmer than the animated bride, but the way in which he kept shifting his amber eyes to the back of the hall suggested that a thin but durable layer of vital excitement simmered underneath his serene facade.

"Obaa-san." Kiku nestled in Serenity's lap, staring with wide-eyed wonder up at her.

"Yes, dear?"

"When is Usa-mama going to be marry Helios-papa? I want to see her dress."

Serenity ran a hand through the girl's curly green hair and smiled. "Usa-chan will be here any moment now. In fact, oh! Kiku, look!" she whispered as Michiru and Haruka began playing the processional canon in very much the same way they had during Serenity's wedding. She hoisted the four-year-old up as the doors opened in the back, revealing the most radiant sight the ex-queen had ever seen. Usagi, brighter and more dazzling than an angel, and her father led the small group of girls to the altar, where Endymion contentedly gave her away to her groom. To his, and Serenity's, son-in-law, she realized with a tingle of satisfaction in her chest. Hotaru grinned at her best female friend as the two stepped up to the minister.

Kiku gazed, transfixed, at her "parents" as they quietly made their vows to one another. Hotaru winked at Arisu, who blushed and mouthed something to her lover, before the child decided to jump out of her grandmother's lap and join in the ceremony, much to the delight of both the audience and the participants.

Endymion, who had taken his seat beside Serenity, chuckled and intwined his fingers with his wife's. "She's going to be quite the little princess when she grows up," he whispered softly into her ear.

"She and her multiple brothers and sisters," Serenity corrected as Helios knelt down and lifted the child into his arms before the minister continued his script.

"You're going to spoil them silly."

"...to have and to hold from this day forward..."

"Yes. Yes, I am. As all grandmothers should."

"...for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer..."

Her husband rolled his eyes. "Is that written in the _Grandmother's Guide to Being a Grandmother_?"

"...in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish..."

Serenity bit back a laugh, instead choosing to squeeze his hand a little too tightly. "It's written in my mind."

"...from this day forward until death do us part," Usagi finished, tears visibly tumbling from her eyes and fading into her smiling lips as she slipped a pure, silver ring onto her husband's waiting finger.

And while the minister invited the groom to kiss his bride, Usagi swung her arm around his neck as she softly pressed a chaste kiss to his lips. Kiku squealed with delight in her father's warm arms.

And the original Tsukino Usagi watched the new family with pride, completely filled with love for those three luminous faces.


	2. She's a Diamond PG

_Diamond in the Rough_

Sailor Moon Monthly LJ - Usagi

Theme: Ordinary

Genre: General

Version: Manga

Rating: PG

* * *

"When I first met Usagi-chan, I was quite aware of her girlish charms, relative immaturity and of course her schoolgirl naivety. How she seemed to have the appetite of a person twice her diminutive size. Her optimism, light, life force. Warmth. The way in which her bright blue eyes twinkled with a luminant sort of spark that beamed out of her irises and pupils whenever she was feeling excited or optimistic; the way her tears felt like the earth's tears, so exquisite and private that I couldn't drag my eyes away from them when they trailed down her cheeks and neck and nose and lips.

"And of course, those odango, wrapped with care each morning as if humanity's very livelihood depended on their spherical perfection, on their symmetry and diameter. Though the girl was never one for precision, her odango never failed to burst from atop her blond head, bubbling in a way only those odango ever could, reaching toward the sky as if to murmur _Hello, sky. Be my friend!_

"But everything about Tsukino Usagi screamed that sentiment. She was likable, effervescent, a diamond in a mound of dark, earthy soil. She was a diamond.

"She was a queen, a beauty, a goddess. A savior.

"She was the world and the moon and the sky and stars. A shooting star on which we all rode into the heavens, drifting with such sanguine innocence that at times she almost seemed unreal," she takes a breath as her eyes begin to sting. "But she was also a girl, a mother, a wife, a spoiled brat, a video game afficionado.

"An ordinary human... with an extraordinary calling," Mars finishes before stepping down from the podium and crossing to the open casket. Even in death, she is the very essence of vitality.

Mars runs a hand through her queen's long hair, decorated with daisies and other flowers Sailor Ceres had conjured before the ceremony. "Enjoy the stars, you baka," she whispers as she softly presses her tear-stained lips against the cold forehead.


	3. Reflections G

_Diamond in the Rough  
_

* * *

Graduation day. Thin ivory candles flicker and snap in the dark temple as an emerald-haired woman whispers a quick prayer before bowing in front of the great marble idol of her grandmother at the center of the temple. Apparently remembering something else, she tosses a coin into the large wooden offering box below the beautiful bust of the first queen of Crystal Tokyo.

"Oh, and please don't let Mother cry too much at the ceremony. She'll embarrass me enough, being... her. I don't need her sniveling like, well, apparently you did at her graduation. No offense, obaa-san. Just a personal preference."

The woman bows once more and left the temple just before a silver silhouette emerges from behind the bust, her blind eyes blinking as a faint smile curls on her translucent face. _I'm afraid that's what mothers do, embarrass their children, Kiku-chan._

And Queen Lady Serenity does just that, blubbering proudly into her mildly embarrassed, white-haired husband's shoulder as the adopted princess delivers her valedictory address. In the palace's temple, the soul of a goddess beams with adoration.


	4. Kiku's Request G

_Diamond in the Rough  
_

* * *

_Bright light city  
You're her religion_

As she basks in the light that floats in through the crystal palace's outer shell, a bird trills a song of rebirth and rejoice. Of love, of peace, of hope. It's a miracle she can hear the songbird from inside of the palace, and for a moment she wonders if her mind created the twittering out of desire for such a symbol of innocence. But no, the blue bird bathes in a bird bath just outside of the exoskeleton, and she presses her fingers and nose against the crystal wall, hoping to get a better glimpse at her new friend.

Instead, she sees the world. The never-ending metropolis around her.

She sees Crystal Tokyo, her crowning glory.

The bird flutters away on thin wings, and the new queen thinks she sees him glance back her and wink.


	5. Her City G

_Diamond in the Rough  
_

* * *

"Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents  
which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant."

- Horace

Uranus stares. There's no way. No. This sweet young thing, this immature little child... How could she possibly be true? Real? She's a mirage, a mistake of God, a lie.

_No one's that good_, she thinks as she gapes at the so-called princess. But there she is, standing tattered and half-dead, holding an infant she had pulled out of the explosion. And though Uranus hates to admit it, a long-dormant part of her stirs in relief as she realizes that the princess, her princess, didn't die in Saturn's attack.

The princess simply stares at her two wayward protectors, wishing that they could see how much she wanted to save them from their painful, solitary lives. She approaches them as her arms envelope the babe, wishing her satellite friends would orbit no more.


	6. Orbit No More PG

_Diamond in the Rough  
_

* * *

Uranus stares. There's no way. No. This sweet young thing, this immature little child... How could she possibly be true? Real? She's a mirage, a mistake of God, a lie.

_No one's that good_, she thinks as she gapes at the so-called princess. But there she is, standing tattered and half-dead, holding an infant she had pulled out of the explosion. And though Uranus hates to admit it, a long-dormant part of her stirs in relief as she realizes that the princess, her princess, didn't die in Saturn's attack.

The princess simply stares at her two wayward protectors, wishing that they could see how much she wanted to save them from their painful, solitary lives. She approaches them as her arms envelope the babe, wishing her satellite friends would orbit no more.


	7. The Consequences of Power Pt I

_Diamond in the Rough  
_

* * *

Her eyes flashed in contempt at the willowy, fading figure sinking with the weight of infinite power pressing into thin, bony shoulders. And though the lights reflected in the figure's shimmering gown of chiffon spun from silver and simmered in the facets of the microscopic slivers of diamond woven into the fabric, the dark-haired woman kneeling in front of this sickly luminous being knew that for all of the grandeur, for all of the theatre and dramatics, what sat in the crystalline throne, intricately carved by the finest smiths in all of Mediterrania, was the ultimate definition of darkness.

"Hino-san," the figure began, her hoarse voice lilting with a false kindness that sends chills down the kneeling woman's spine. "You have been the one to stick with me through until the very end of our little game, haven't you?" she cooed.

The woman below her grunted in response, staring resentfully at a red ribbon intertwined in the long, blond tails on her mistress's head. That ribbon wasn't hers; it wasn't natural for her mistress to wear it. _Minako, I'll avenge you._

Silver, blind eyes narrowed at the dark-haired woman's thought, and the being laughed throatily, prompting the servant to flinch. "Hino-san, traitorous thoughts are as evil as traitorous actions. Don't be a subversive, my dear. Protect and keep your loving mistress, Hino-san. Protect and keep her, for she is all you have left on which you can cling."

A gnarled, graying arm lifted from the mistress's lap and as if her unseeing eyes could indeed behold what her crooked hands were conjuring in front of the subservient, her cracked ashen lips curled slowly into a sour grin as a young man with soft curls silently cried out to a sniveling woman before being struck by some terrible force from behind. The image kept playing in front of the servant's face as tears stung her violet eyes. They fell in soft drops to the crystal tiles below her slim body, puddling in the cracks between each marbled crystal slab.

"Should I stop?"

Silence.

"Answer your queen."

"D-don't st-"

A blast of white light sent her flying across the cold throneroom. "Stuttering shows weakness, Hino-san. You are the goddess of war, no?" Blind eyes twinkled as they gazed into a sightless world, seeing sightless objects and hearing sightless sounds. Back in Crystal Tokyo, Hino Rei nodded, pulling herself to her feet.

"Fine, then, my Queen. Don't stop the hologram," she replied, a fire kindling inside of her chest. With the retraction of the aged gray arm, the image faded into nothingness. Rei furrowed her brow at the sudden dismissal of her wish, but said nothing as her queen chuckled.

"Hino-san," the mistress croaked, beckoning the woman forward with the twitch of a decrepit finger. "Rei-chan," she corrected, blind eyes suddenly flashing with blue. "Sailor Mars. Yes, that is who you truly are. No worldy name describes the woman before me more than Sailor Mars, senshi of war. Senshi of massacre and bloodshed and destruction. That is who you shall be forever more."

The frail queen lifted her arm once more and pointed a single dying digit at the senshi, who seemed to sense the moment's true ending. And so she was ready to deliver one final blow before that great white light overtook her as it had all of those who had stepped in the way of their once-divine sovereign. So ignoring a tear that silently stumbled down her pale cheek, she inhaled the power of the dead stars around her to cling to her as she spoke what they all had tried to.

"You are the one we have always fought." The words iced over the queen's emaciated figure as she lowered her arm slightly.

"What, my dear, makes you say such a thing?" But she smirks.

Hino Rei felt the fire in her spirit augmenting. And she continued as if the queen hadn't interrupted. "All of the evils of this universe, all of the misery and suffering and... burning... were caused by you. You and your ginzuishou, your talisman of death." The smirk broadened into a toothless grin. "You built an empire of the Earth and guarded peace with a pure heart, and as each millennium ended, you lost a bit of that purity and found... pleasure in that crystal.

"And soon it drove you mad, didn't it? It drove you to insanity, where you found a lust for blood and hate, where you killed your beloved husband and banished your daughter and her family! You had us all under your spell as you destroyed and murdered and savaged the universe's population until you found out that it will only be a matter of time until your body dies and that black creature you call your spirit consumes all," she spat. The queen's smirk fell into a thin line. "But you'll not win this, my Queen. For there is one last hope for peace gliding through the stars, waiting for the time at which you will show yourself to her blinding light."

"And who might this so-called 'hope for peace' be, my beloved?" the queen asked softly as a flicker of light flashed from her pointed fingertips.

"Cosmos," the last senshi gasped as her body burst into blazing white and blue flames. "S-Sailor Cosmos... will... co-come..."

Sightlessly watching the body of her last servant disintegrate into a molten pile of plasma and ash, Chaos stood from her throne, holding her hands in front of her wilting face. "Oh, let my daughter come," she whispered, feeling cold breath caressing her palms. "I would like to show her the true meaning of power."

In a distant galaxy, a lone woman with long rose-colored hair watched the starless sky with clear crimson eyes, waiting for the call.

And it came as the lights of the universe blinked out in one fatal swoop of a cold, dying hand.

* * *

I've wanted to write something like this for a long time. I've always wondered how Usagi/NQS could tolerate the intense seduction of the ginzuishou, and I realized that... well, it's more interesting (and realistic) to have her fall from grace... so hard, in fact, that she transitions into the one entity she always fought in her idealistic and pure youth.

If you didn't guess, Mars is suggesting that Sailor Cosmos, who is actually the banished Princess Lady Serenity. is planning on returning to Crystal Tokyo to destroy the ginzuishou and Chaos. Of course, this would be after Cosmos returns to the 20th century to meet Usagi and friends. I'll definitely write the second part of this fanfic because I'm really interested with where it could potentially take Chaos/NQS and Cosmos/Lady Serenity. I'll also have to figure out how to include a backstory of how Princess Usagi came to usurp the title of Cosmos from her mother, and what happened to her family and guardian senshi.


	8. An Enlightening Experience PG

Diamond in the Rough

* * *

_The National Diet of Japan is Japan's bicameral legislature. It is composed of a lower house, called the House of Representatives, and an upper house, called the House of Chancellors. Both houses of the Diet are directly elected under a parallel voting system. In addition to passing laws, the Diet is formally responsible for selecting the Prime Minister. _- Wikipedia

"Today, my darling, we are taking a little field trip to the Diet."

A pair of ears perked up. The sixteen-year-old princess had been getting antsy, and her mother had picked up on the teen's boredom rather quickly. Still, there were tasks that had to be accomplished and skills to be learned, and though Serenity was not quite ready for a break from her daughter's weekly princess lessons, she knew the value in educational field trips quite well. Besides, the girl had been working hard in school, so one day off wouldn't hurt her.

Oh, and Serenity really needed to get back to the legislative branch of the government at some point, considering she hadn't been in seven months. Usagi grinned. "Finally! Something of actual importance!"

The queen frowned at her daughter. "Usa-chan, studying the culture of the Roman Empire will only benefit you when you ascend the throne someday." She leaned closer to the younger girl. "And besides, if you learn everything well, Mina-chan said she'd perform at your birthday party."

With that, Usagi rolled her eyes and pulled her jacket over her gray school uniform. "Let's go, okaa-chan! Maybe Hotaru and the other girls can come, too?"

Of course, it only took a good ten minutes in the viewing room designated for the Royal family for Serenity to recall exactly why she had stopped attending the Diet's meetings in the first place. Although Usagi and Arisu appeared to be genuinely interested in the verbal sparring of the legislators, the rest of the group was not. Sailor Saturn sat beside the queen, her glaive absentmindedly bobbing up and down on her knee as she stared longingly at the green-haired incarnation of Juno who stood beside the princess. Sayuri and Natsume played Black Jack, and the former had apparently conned the latter out of a week's salary. The youngest and smallest of the Quartet, Sachiko, danced lithely around the room as if in her own dreamy realm, practicing the acrobatic skills only she had retained from her previous life.

The queen found the current debate, on whether or not the Crystal Tokyian government had a case for having a case for abolishing the severe gum restrictions they had adopted to appease the Singaporeans at the beginning of the imperial days, dreadfully boring. Weren't there other issues more important? What about the illegal mining project on Venus? What was being done about that?

_Sometimes I think it might just be better to get rid of the Diet. What a waste of resources_, she thought as she examined the older men and women arguing with one another just beyond the large one-way glass window.

Granted, she understood the necessity of having a balanced government, but still... sometimes she wondered if all of the bureaucracy did nothing more than slow the entire political process down.

When the trip ended, Usagi linked her arm with her mother's. "Okaa-chan, that was a surprisingly enlightening experience."

"They were fighting about gum." Serenity furrowed her brow. "Not even. They were fighting about fighting over gum."

Usagi shrugged. "I didn't say the topic was enlightening. I just said the experience was." Seeing that her mother didn't quite understand, she elaborated. "It's funny how people have this innate urge to fight and battle through life. Even over silly things like gum. And, I dunno, but it seems like a good example of what happens when people get power-hungry. They just fight and fight and fight, even if there isn't really anything to fight for. Or rather, even if what they think they are fighting for isn't really what they are fighting for at all, but a decoy, a shadow, of their true objectives."

The princess sighed, suddenly looking a lot older than her body's age of sixteen. "Isn't it possible that the real debate was actually focused on evolving our traditions and moving toward the future in our values and ideals?"

The queen's eyebrows shot to her hairline. "Yes, I suppose so," she agreed, completely caught off guard by her daughter's analysis of the Diet's seemingly fruitless debate.

A smile flickered across Usagi's face. "Then I would certainly say that trip was enlightening."

Yes, it was. It revealed a hint of discontent in the government and the wealthy elite, a discontent that would trouble Serenity for the remainder of her reign.


End file.
